Saudi Arabia and its links to 'Islamic State'

Relations between the rulers of Saudi Arabia, the Wahhabi clerics that control its religious life, and the Wahhabi-inspired so-called 'Islamic State' (IS) have come under increasing scrutiny in the Arab world and globally.

Like many features of life in the Saudi kingdom, the links between Wahhabism and IS appear ambivalent but now increasingly discernible.

On 22 January in an interview with Middle East Broadcasting (MBC), which is operated from the Gulf state of Dubai, a leading Saudi-Wahhabi cleric declared that the 'Islamic State' (IS) followed the ideological principles of the official Saudi sect.

As reported by Middle East Eye, Adel Al-Kalbani, the former imam of the Grand Mosque in Mecca – the holiest site in Islam – appeared to justify IS atrocities, including beheadings, on the ground that IS and the Saudi Wahhabi clerics agreed to their legitimacy.

Al-Kalbani said, 'We follow the same thought [as IS] but apply it in a refined way... They draw their ideas from what is written in our own books, from our own principles'.

He added, 'We do not criticise the thought on which it (IS) is based'.

Al-Kalbani addressed the killing of journalists by IS, including Americans James Foley and Steven Sotloff.

He said: 'Their blood was shed according to salafi fatwas (religious opinions), not outside the salafi framework'.

Saudi Wahhabi clerics and apologists for them frequently use the term 'salafi' to present themselves as emulators of the original companions and successors of Muhammad.

Al-Kalbani said in the MBC interview that Saudi Wahhabis and IS shared the same view of 'apostates' or renegades from Islam, calling for their execution.

BBC's HardTalk programme on 3 February, interviewed General Mansour Al-Turki, a spokesman for the Saudi Arabian Ministry of the Interior, about the Saudi connection with IS.

Al-Turki denied that the kingdom had ever funded terrorism, but admitted there had been 'misuse of our financial system'.

The interior ministry spokesman insisted, 'We did not fund any terrorist organisations. We did not fund any'.

He did say, however, that in recent times there had been abuse of the financial structure that existed 'long before any terrorist organisation'.

According to Al-Turki, donations for alleviation of poverty were diverted to Afghanistan and al-Qaida.

To avoid further financial assistance being siphoned off to radical groups, the Saudi government now supervised all charitable activities: a measure that was increasingly resented by Saudi citizens, he added.

She writes in Dying for Faith '... jihadism is a cultural expression grounded in strong religious interpretation that is indigenous to Saudi Arabia. It is essential to consider the role played by the Saudi regime in creating a context that allows it to grow.

'In many respects the violence of the jihadis represents a mirror reflecting the violence of the state and its official ulema'.

Until the monopoly over religious life in the kingdom is removed from the Wahhabi sect, more open-minded leaders will be trumped by their dangerous preachers.